Taft Police had to cope with an outbreak of automobile thefts involving vehicle coming and going from all directions in a 24-hour period last week.

It ended up with four people – the youngest a 13-year-old San Luis Obispo County boy – in custody.

It all started about 10:20 a.m. Friday morning when Taft Police officer Moises Martinez spotted a couple of teenagers in a car that he thought looked suspicious.

He was right.

Martinez made a traffic stop on the vehicle in the parking lot in front of Albertsons.

The car turned out to be stolen, and the two teens, identified as Shawn Dakota Smith and Eugene Lobera, both 18, were charged with possession of known stolen property, Chief of Police Ed Whiting said.

Two hours later, about 12:30 p.m., Kern County Sheriff's deputies received a report of a stolen car.

About the time the information went out over the radio, Taft Police Lt. Pete Aranda found himself right behind the suspect vehicle in the 600 block of Rose Avenue.

Aranda got behind the suspect vehicle, a maroon minivan, and activated his lights and sirens.

The suspect drove north on Rose from South Street to Buena Vista, then turned on Buena Vista at a “slow, deliberate” rate of speed, Whiting said, then went north on Naylor and accelerated to 40 to 40 miles per hour despite what Whiting described as “heavy pedestrian and vehicle traffic.”